Losses worth crores in excise and power dept due to non-imposition of penalty, says CAG report

The latest CAG report for the year ended March 31, 2017 has recorded notional losses running into several hundred crores suffered by the state government especially in the power and excise departments.

According to the report which was tabled in the state assembly last week, the losses are mainly due to delay in recovering of penalty and other charges by the departments. Commenting on the working of distilleries in the state, the report said, “The excise department did not impose fines amounting to Rs 346.53 crore due to non-adherence of environmental norms by distilleries.

The department also failed to impose duty amounting to Rs 2.46 crore on higher content of alcohol than prescribed. Not achieving norms of minimum production, fermentation and distillation efficiency prescribed in the rules and loss of Total Reducing Sugar and molasses during transit resulted in loss of excise revenue of Rs 2.67 crore.”

Among the three distilleries in the state, the Laksar distillery owed Rs 137 crore as fine while the one in Bazpur owed Rs 112 crore and the Kuanwala distillery owed Rs 7.49 crore, the report said. Read More